“Oh! Oh! I know!” Andrea said loudly, clapping her hands together.
“Andie, no—”
“She wants you to enroll her brother into the training school! That’s all!” Andrea said.
Huh?
“Is that it, Lily? You just want Luke to go to the training school?” Felix asked.
Lily was glaring at Andrea, who for all the world didn’t seem to notice.
Instead, she was spinning in her chair, still smiling at having solved the problem.
Realizing there was absolutely no point to her anger, Lily looked back to Felix.
“Yes. If… if we have him go through the school, and load him up with some work skills, he could probably live a normal life in Legion. He missed most of his education. It’ll be hard enough for him to catch up in a regular school. He’s technically in Legion, just… not really,” Lily said.
Alright, leave it at that, idiot. Her personal affairs don’t need to be the subject of a board meeting.
“Consider it done. I know we probably gave him some tutors, but can we get better ones? Worst case, I’ll see if I can put elementary education into a skill book for him.
“Put in the paperwork for all of it, I’ll sign it. Anything else though? It seems like everything is on the right path. Or at least, heading in the right direction,” Felix said.
Once again, he looked to each person around the table. Inviting them to add anything.
“Everyone is free to go then. You get,” Felix paused, looking at his watch, “forty-five minutes back in your day.”
Victoria, Kit, and Miu got up and immediately left together. He imagined they were going to go over the situation reports from yesterday some more.
Andrea and Lily took flanking positions on his left and right sides.
“Hang back for a second, Felix,” Lily said softly as Felix started to stand up.
Felix felt like this was going to be a problem, but he didn’t feel like arguing right now. Sitting back down heavily in his chair he immediately pulled up his workstation from the desk.
“Ok? What’s up?” he asked, quickly flipping through the windows on his screen. Pulling up the blueprints for the school they were purchasing he stopped.
They were both silent. Which was never a good sign.
Putting his attention on Andrea, she looked away rather than meet his eyes. Moving his focus to Lily, she nearly did the same thing.
“Uh… what’s the problem?” Felix asked, his paranoia ramping up several levels.
In front of him, there was a static hiss. The type you hear when you turn on a television set that’s not plugged into anything.
A small blue dot appeared in mid air, drawing everyone’s attention.
“What in the world…” Felix said, staring at it.
As if it had always been so, the blue dot blew apart into an oval of crackling energy and distortion.
Through that oval, that window, that dimensional gate, as what else could it be, Felix could see three people.
A man, a woman, and a Beastkin.
Each looked road stained but dressed more akin to what he saw in movies about apocalyptic scenarios.
They were standing at what looked like an old-fashioned control station from an old TV show. There was little else in the room save for other control stations and bones.
“What the…” Felix said, squinting to get a better view.
Andrea reacted first, pulling an SMG out from under her jacket and positioning it up against her shoulder. She neatly clicked the safety off and slipped her finger into the trigger guard.
“Andrea, wait!” Felix said, hoping he could stop this before it turned into a bloodbath.
A dirt stained and beautiful pale skinned Beastkin, she looked like a cat-tribe type to Felix, leapt on top of the control panel.
Andrea could only be considered domesticated in the face of this feral version.
The Beastkin had hot glowing red eyes. She arched her back and hissed at them, her eyes dilated to slits and clearly on the defensive.
Lily stood up and held out a hand, blazing red runes spreading out in every direction around Felix, Andrea, and Lily.
A woman who looked more the part of a beauty queen held out a staff as she stepped up next to the man in the portal. Bright green energy started to blow out from her, quickly filling the room the three people were standing in and creeping through the portal.
The man moved something in front of him, and the portal winked out of existence.
Felix stared at where the portal had been, the hair on the back of his neck standing up straight. His skin was tingling.
His thoughts were dull and slowed.
Lily and Andrea seemed equally surprised and at a loss.
After the span of several breaths, Felix woke up from his stupor.
“Get me White and Felicia on the line, Andrea. At the same time, Lily, have someone find me Kit,” Felix said.
Opening up his desktop terminal again, he started plowing through all the files he had on super powers.
Portals, portals, portals. Who can make portals? Who were they? How did they do that? Can I do it? Can I make a machine? Can I give it to Eva?
What if I can. Can I use it as a weapon? What… what if that was another world? Can I branch not just out of the city of Skippercity, but the very planet?
Felix was lost in his thoughts. The possibilities were spinning endlessly out in front of him.
He had work to do.
Chapter 7 - Thinking with Portals -
Felix drummed his fingers along the edge of the terminal. He’d been sitting there unmoving since the strange portal popped open in front of them earlier.
“Felix?” Kit asked, coming into the conference room. Five Andreas twitched in unison at her entry, one in each corner, and one at Felix’s side.
“What’s wrong? Everyone is running around in a hurry,” Kit said, her brows knitting together.
“Hm? Oh… ah… someone opened a portal out of thin air. Right over there in fact,” he said, motioning to the exact spot. “Opened up like it was always there. Poof. Then vanished just as quickly. I want to see if I can’t get that for ourselves.”
Kit frowned at that, her eyes set on the area he’d indicated.
“Anyways. Have a seat. I think we should talk,” Felix said with a practiced smile. He indicated the seat directly across from himself at the table.
“No conversation has ever gone well that started that way,” Kit muttered. “And I should know. I’m in HR.”
“Ha… very funny,” Felix responded, still pointing to the chair. “Sit your booty down.”
Rolling her eyes, Kit did as instructed. She gave him her best “HR knows best” look as she did so.
“Should I make pancakes? Pancakes makes every situation better,” Andrea asked.
“No, Andrea, it’s fine. This actually isn’t a bad conversation, though… I doubt it’ll be comfortable.
“And diving right into that. Kit, I’d like to talk about the fact that you don’t trust me,” Felix said without regard to how it came across.
“I… what?” she asked, her eyes narrowing.
“Of course she trusts you!” Andrea argued, slapping a palm against his shoulder.
“No, she doesn’t. Not in the way you’re thinking. You never did, not fully, Kit. I think that’s partially due to the fact that you can’t read my mind,” Felix said, folding his hands together in front of himself.
He kept the eye contact steady, his tone neutral, but direct.
Don’t scare them, but don’t let up. Come from curious.
“It’s very possible that I’ve misread the situation. I wouldn’t doubt it for one minute. Maybe you could explain it to me from your own perspective?” Felix asked.
Kit’s mouth twitched as she fought whatever emotion had attempted to gain traction.
Andrea pouted at him. She was fond of Kit, he imagined she didn’t quite care for his accusations.
The four in the corner were in their Myriad impersonations, all holding an SMG ready.